sponsors

Archive for June, 2009

In truth, they’re a little out of control. And I was really hoping to wait for the sunflowers to bloom before I posted pictures, but who knows how long that will really take. And actually, the tomato plants are so tall they’re blocking the sunflowers anyway.

In order to satisfy everyone’s before/after fix for the day, here we go:

It was quite a daunting project, as you can see. This thicket of weeds was the remnants of our garden last year. Let’s just say it went a little untended with the wedding the the trip to Australia and the holidays and everything.

Progress…

Notice how we actually have to move the dirt mound on the right before we can put the other 2 beds in.

Oh, they were so cute back then.

I found out quickly that the squash/cucumber trellis wasn’t tall enough so I tied a few extra pieces of wood along each side.

Isn’t Laura’s belly neat? (being that this if our first baby of the group, we’re all pretty amazed by this whole pregnancy thing). We played smashball for hours in our bikinis and I’m pretty sure our fellow beach go-ers were thoroughly entertained watching her lunge for balls with her belly in tow.

It’s always so nice to spend time with your girls.

Also, we found this on the way to breakfast on Sunday morning:

Free flowers are awesome, but even better because my friend Katya just posted this guy on her blog last week and we happened to drive by the same spot. The magic of the blog world. I’m starting to think that everyone should have one, or at least all of my friends. It would be so much easier to keep up with each others’ lives.

It was a good weekend. And this is a very short week. Wednesday night I’m off to Nantucket. Anyone have any must-do’s while we’re there?

I’m down in San Diego for the weekend, spending lots of time with my bestest girlfriends from college and celebrating our first baby on the way. The mama-to-be, Laura, came in from Georgia, Nikki flew in from Switzerland, Joy is down from San Fran… But we’ll miss our reps from Washington, Hawaii, and Australia. Plus some of us are boring and just drove down from LA. We’re so spread out in our advancing age but it’s nice to come together whenever we can manage and just laugh for the entire weekend.

We’ll be eating lots of eggs (and squash), so here… you can virtually share with us.

But then again, how could you possibly eat all of that food? we can barely BARELY give away all the stuff coming out of our garden right now. Though I should mention that most of that stuff is squash and really, people can only eat so much of it.

Next year I will turn our ENTIRE BACKYARD into raised beds and get a stand at the farmer’s market and live a fruitful life of food growing and cooking.

It was really more of a time and busy-ness issue than a conscious decision. Melanie was all for letting them roam and we decided that if someone showed intense fear we would certainly put them away.

(see her there under the chair?)

Or if they started jumping on tables. Which they actually did. WHAT?? They all of a sudden became little social butterflies scavenging around under people’s feet, hoping for teensy crumbs of cheese and beet dip and crudite. Which everyone seemed to think was great fun, or least sufficiently novel, until the jumping on the tables. I didn’t even know they could jump that high. Luckily that didn’t happen until just about dinner time which was when they needed to go into their coop anyway.

Funny times with farm animals at a party. Though really, the women were in general pretty excited about seeing chickens roaming about. Nice call everyone! Thanks for your advice.

Even though I kind of knew what you were going to say.

More pics soon. I was mostly incapacitated from exhaustion for the rest of the weekend so I haven’t gotten around to sifting through the photos.

Do you like my vintage tablecloths I’ve diligently won on ebay over the last few weeks? 2 were my grandma’s but the rest are the result of hours of clicking and subsequent overbidding. I believe I mentioned that I was having a small problem with ebay as of late? But look at my spoils:

aren’t they cute?

They are going to be perfect strewn about the tables on the back patio tomorrow eve. But the big question is, should I let the chickens roam free when the ladies are about?

They are relatively well behaved as chickens go. And they mostly keep to themselves. It’s just that I’d have to put them away before 5 and that’s like a full 3 hours before they normally go back into their coop.

Plus wouldn’t it be cute to see chickens scratching around during my rustic-barn-wedding-that-I-didn’t-get-so-I-instead-disguised-it-as-my-sister-in-law’s-shower?

See her there, above the wheel barrow that I’m going to use as an open cooler-thing for wine? (I had to do a test run when I got home to find the rentals delivered and in the backyard). Wouldn’t she make a nice addition?

Opinions please. Brock thinks I should put them away. But he doesn’t know. Necessarily.

Remember that radish salad I said I made a few weeks back? It’s so simple it really doesn’t need a recipe. Probably this picture is plenty to make your own, but I’ll list the ingredients just in case.

RadishesAvocadoCilantroOlive OilLimeSaltPepper

You could probably add something spicy (maybe a jalapeño) to jazz it up. Or some cotija cheese? Or really anything. But it’s pretty good just like this. Not my finest concoction, mind you. But pretty good.

Also, I should mention, that in something as simple as this the ingredients make all the difference. A perfect avocado and really fresh radishes with good quality olive oil yield a completely different salad than one made with less ideal substitutions.

So much for seeing you all on Monday. Some weeks are just like that, you know? First, a big hi-hello-welcome-thanks for coming over to peeps from Simple Lovely! It was so nice to see all of your sweet comments come in over the weekend. I do hope you enjoy yourself, and maybe even come back.

So much going on right now, some of which really doesn’t make me want to sit in front of my computer at night, but then again this is fun too.

The weekend was… good.

We took a nice hike up through Temescal Canyon on Friday and found a few flowers still in the throws of spring. This one was so pretty with it’s furry yellow insides. But what is it?

My brother did a demo at a glass studio open house (he’s a glassblower), and it was really fun to watch him work. He’s lived out of state since college and is finally back to start grad school. It’s good to have a brother around.

I was pretty into the little bits of colored glass scattered under the work bench. I took one home (thinking I’d make it into a Christmas ornament?) but it broke into a hundred pieces in my purse. Like my brother said it would.

More prep for this weekend’s party. So glad it’s here, though I could use a few more weekends to make perfect little wine tasting bottle numbers and cards and things. Instead I made balsamic cherries for the cheese platter. They are divine and require little thought. Here is the “recipe”: Balsamic, brown sugar, vanilla bean, cherries. I literally made it up over the stove.

And look who finally found the backdoor in a small, curious herd. They were so funny inching their way deeper into the laundry room and then the kitchen. We are getting to know each other, the chickens and I. Though, for the record, they are not allowed in the house. I had to get a picture before I shooed them out.

And now the week begins. And is almost over. It’s weird how weeks do that.